Beanstalk, Part 2

Our little boy grew! Well, in some areas...

"Are you talking about me again?"

Carson had his 6-month checkup 3 weeks ago. And nothing like a trip to the Dr's office to make you feel like a bad mother. After arriving and being taken back to a room, the assistant promptly got to taking measurements, height and weight, and then came back with the stats print-out and announcement "The Doctor's going to want to talk to you, because his weight has dropped and everything else is lower too." Oh great...Just what I needed. I thought he was eating just fine. He was sleeping well at night (hooray?) and was just a generally happy baby overall. What could I have possibly done wrong to cause his weight to drop? 20 minutes later of wondering and waiting, the doc comes in and does his exam. Everything seems normal until we get to the issue of eating.

"I'm a happy boy 97% of the time!"

Long explanation short: He was previously getting about 24oz of milk per day (6, 4oz feedings), but based on his height and weight and where he needed to be, I should have been feeding him about 40oz per day (who knew, right? I mean, he never cried when he finished a bottle). Doc says his body is just barely functioning to keep his heart and organs working (just what a mom wants to hear, right? That she's basically starving her child unintentionally?) and that I needed to start feeding him every 3 hours around the clock and make sure he got at least 800 calories per day. Wow! I soon had a lot of work ahead of me for the next 2 weeks. And no more sleeping through the night from 7pm - 6am :(



Less than 2 weeks later, we hit success. Carson had put on nearly 2lbs in 10 days! So while he still isn't at the approximate 18lbs he should have been, we're still working on it. But it's better than having put on less than 1/2lb in 2 months. It's still a lot of work - having to feed him every 3 hours to keep up with the growth and make sure he's on track for our next visit. However, some of his skills have improved because of the weight gain. So Hooray to a healthy growing boy! (and yay to mommy for learning what not to have happen again)

With Sympathy...kind of...

I saw this greeting card online and wanted to share it with everyone who this applies to.


There's a reason I didn't make any resolution's. Life is just better when I'm happy and not focusing on my failures :)

Free Burritos for Amigos

Just spreading the word... might not make it there myself...

Is It In You?

I do bookkeeping entries for a charity, and today while entering in a phone number for a supporter, I saw this in the last four digits:

1337

Now to most people it just looks like the numbers one, three, three, seven. But my eyes actually read it as this:

leet

That's when you know that you have it in you -- you don't see numbers anymore, just words made out of numbers. You see the "code", kinda like the Matrix. I had to laugh at myself and say "What a nerd I am!" So I ask all of you reading this,

Do you have it in you?

To find out more about leet speak, visit the Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leet

Gotz Skillz

I can hold the pacifier with my hand and even put it in my mouth.

I can rock out to Lynyrd Skynyrd with Daddy's headphones.

I can gulp big-boy drinks from the bottom of the can.

I can eat from a spoon. YUM!

I can hold my own bottle.

I can take my own picture.

I can give high-fives.


I can fall asleep on my own...most of the time.


I can hold books myself.


I can turn the pages of books.


I can eat books. My favorite!

I can chill and look cute doing it at the same time.

Do You Gotz Skillz?

A Day with Nature

Thursday this week we took our first major outing to see some nature- butterflies, wildflowers, desert plants, oh yeah, and some Chihuly glass sculptures. This was all at the Desert Botanical Gardens. Gigi (or G.G. for Grandma Green) had an annual membership which let us in for free. Yay! It was very crowded on a beautiful Arizona spring day. It got incredibly windy later that afternoon, so thankfully we were done before that hit.

All Snugli-ed up and ready to go! He was practically the only infant there in a baby carrier. Everyone else had strollers which only clogged the busy pathways. Go Mommy for thinking of this! But Carson's poor little feet were a slightly blue at the end :(

First up, the butterfly exhibit. I was especially excited about this because I'd been to one back in Pennsylvania before and it was amazing. However, I was a little let down here in Phoenix. The butterflies were in an outdoor environment (rather than indoor with humidity levels cranked up and monitored), which probably limited the types of butterflies and the quantity. I expected hundreds to be flying around and landing all over us, however that didn't happen. Bummer. But there were a couple cool ones to see.

My favorite little butterfly, of course! Too bad his eyes were closed, haha

Now, on to the Chihuly glass sculptures. There were many different displays there and I didn't get a picture of all of them. You can visit his website to see some more professional shots. There were way too many people around and some of the glass was in shaded areas that didn't let the line shine well and really show off the sculpture. These were some of my favorites.

"Agaves" at the entrance

"Hornets" - I love the texture on these. How does he do that?!

"Float Boat" - looks like a bunch of marbles with cool swirls of colors

"Blue Flamingos" - these are actually sitting in a little stream, but I didn't photograph that well enough

"Red Trumpets" - probably not the official title, but Carson was getting tired at this point, so we wrapped it up. I love the vibrant red!

He was zonked out in the end. We had only been walking for an hour, but it was way past his sleepy time. We had a great day. Thanks Gigi!

A Week of Firsts

Last week was pretty eventful, in terms of Carson's new experiences, skills and abilities. And of course, we didn't have any video or camera in hand to document all of these, so you'll just have to take my word for it (and look at pictures that are similar to the event itself).

March 19th

Yup, off with the little mullet....

Before

After

So it's not perfect hair, but hey, it's an improvement. Good job, Daddy!

March 19th

He rolled from his stomach to his back -- FINALLY! We have been working on this for almost 2 months now, and while relaxing in the backyard one afternoon, he got enough momentum to complete the roll to his back. We've been having the dogs show him how to rollover on command, but Carson still doesn't get it. Maybe that's because the dogs usually get a treat afterwards :) We haven't developed a reward system for Carson other than enthusiastic praises of "Good Job!" "Wooo--hooo!!" "You did it!" He usually smiles at those - which is a good enough reward for him.

Using the arm to push off

Arching the back

March 19th

It was a great day! I put him down for 3 naps, and each time he didn't make a single peep!! He just pulls this little yellow blankie over his eyes, and was O-U-T before I could even walk out the bedroom. Could I ask for anything more sweet than that? Yes, actually, because he did it again when it was time for bed that night. I just love my little man.

So March 19th was quite an eventful day. Too bad we haven't had more of that since, (especially in the napping and bedtime department) but hey, I'll take 1 day if I can get it!